Answer the question

After catching a number of weekend news shows, one thing remained annoyingly consistent through nearly every interview I saw on politics and the elections: almost none of them clarified the most glaring issue in the stem cell controversy, and nearly all of them allowed politicians to dodge questions.

Candidates, incumbents, strategists and pundits kept twisting words and obfuscating. Or simply redirecting the dialogue back to their talking points. Never mind that a politician was asked a direct question, and repeatedly sometimes. Instead of answering it, or saying the question wasn’t accurate or fair, they started talking about something else, in a sort of Alice in Wonderland atmosphere. I started talking to the TV….”but what’s the answer?”

On the issue of stem cells, nearly all the shows talked about the Michael J. Fox commercial and the hot controversy over who supports stem cell research and who opposes it, and what that will mean on election day. It came to light that when Fox filmed the commercial, he had not actually read the Missouri Amendment 2, which he said meant a lot to the nation beyond Missouri. In a televised interview he has since admitted that he wasn’t aware of the details of the initiative, but said he was sure he would agree with it, whatever it says.

Seriously.

All of this adds to the emotional atmosphere of the intended message that if you care about people who suffer debilitating and degenerative diseases, you will back stem cell research. And if you don’t back stem cell research, you’re an accomplice to setting back scientific progress and treatment, and you don’t care.

I talked to the TV on this one, too, and every time they said “stem cells” I asked “which ones?” As complex as the science may be in the biomedical research and treatment, this whole debate can be much more clearly understood by that simple clarification. The right question on this one is “which stem cells are you talking about — embryonic, adult or cord blood?” Two of those are perfectly moral and successful biotech alternatives. Embryonic stem cells require taking human life. In addition, the Missouri amendment includes human cloning as part of the process of conducting the embryonic stem cell research.

Be aware and informed. And listen to all the things the pundits are not saying.